Why we care: How do you make a Spider-Man villain movie without Spider-Man? That’s the question facing director Ruben Fleischer (Zombieland), and by the looks of this first trailer, he’s going with the origin story of how Eddie Brock (Hardy) becomes conjoined with an alien symbiote to turn into Venom.

According to nerdier reports, the storyline will be based on two different Venom comic book series. The first, 1993’s Venom: Lethal Protector, in which Venom goes from villain to antihero, and the second is 1995’s Planet of the Symbiotes, where Earth is invaded by an army of symbiotes.

But you wouldn’t know any of that from the looks of this trailer. Given the vague, guy-in-trouble vibe, it could be a teaser for any number of superhero origin stories. But perhaps this is why they call it a “teaser.” Either that or, because the film’s still in production, this is all the best footage they could scrape up for now. Either way, it’s left some fans a bit choked they didn’t get a glimpse of the snaggle-toothed alien itself.JB